


In Your Pride

by Cyn



Category: Ace wo Nerae
Genre: Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2007, recipient:Psyienna
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-25
Updated: 2007-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-21 19:15:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/228686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cyn/pseuds/Cyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryuuzaki burns with questions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Your Pride

**Author's Note:**

  * For [psyienna](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=psyienna).



> I hope this works for you, Psyienna! It was a joy to write for the fandom, finally.

Ryuuzaki watches Oka from the corner of her eye, refusing to let everyone else know that she's watching her, watching them; there is little motivation in the world that will allow her to unbend enough to show anything to the coach who has come to disrupt her once almost-perfect world.

Munakata catches her even though she thinks she's hiding it so well and just looks; no smile, no frown, just a look, directed at her, and Ryuuzaki misses the ball that her opponent serves into her court - a most displeasing circumstance.

Her next return is fast, her form perfect, her mannerisms confident, but Munakata has already returned his attention to Oka and doesn't see anything else, although Ryuuzaki suspects he knows and is, in his own way, gloating. She's never attempted to impress anyone before, thinking such things are beneath her. Her skills are excellent; that speaks for itself.

Ryuuzaki serves next, and her aim is fast, sharp; her opponent can't return it. And the following serve, and the next, until she takes the game: without realizing, each serve has been mentally directed at Munakata, not her simple second year opponent. Ryuuzaki looks across at the other girl, an apology almost on her lips, but the other girl is looking at her in something like awe, and the words die before they can be spoken.

Munakata is watching her now, she realizes, and there is the ghost of a smirk on his lips, although Ryuuzaki isn't sure if she imagines it or not, for he goes back to looking at her normally - if a most unconcerned look could be counted as normal.

He has never looked at her in awe, will never: there is no admiration for her skills in his eyes, no desire to push her forward, no joy that he has such a great tennis player.

Instead, Ryuuzaki only sees a drive, a force: none for her, but for the girl she drew forth from the woodwork.

It rankles, more than anything Ryuuzaki thought possible.

-

"Pick up your feet more," Munakata snaps, and serves another ball, and Ryuuzaki pauses to look inside the gym, where his voice is coming from: Oka is there, tied and worn to a point Ryuuzaki has never seen before and still Munakata drives her.

She leaves before either of them could notice her, not that they would. At least, that is the excuse Ryuuzaki uses in her mind, instantly hating herself for the lie; she does not resort to direct lies, even to herself.

But the truth is more painful than she wishes to admit: Ryuuzaki knows the pain of training day after day and never being good enough. And she knows that Oka will do more than she has ever done.

-

"You tried to drive her away," Munakata says, days later, and steps in front of her, when Ryuuzaki would try to move away; direct confrontations are not her strong point and Munakata is a driving, direct force she does not wish to handle. "Jealous?"

"I do not indulge in such petty emotions," Ryuuzaki tells him, and does not smile, and mentally hopes he will accept her words for more than they are.

Munakata looks over her head, and focuses on something - Oka, Ryuuzaki thinks; she'll never know if she is right, though, because he returns his gaze to her right away, direct and piercing. He takes her words for exactly what they are.

"Hiromi has the potential to be a great player," he tells her, and Ryuuzaki can only wonder if she actually hears the pride buried in his voice, and doesn't wonder if it is for Oka herself, or in his own skills at potentially producing a great tennis player. She burns to ask more, to know why: why Oka, why not her, why not Midorikawa, why not any other talented tennis player. Instead, she bows her head and leaves the court.

Munakata's voice stops her before she can take but a few steps away from him.

"Don't make her choose again."

"Would you like me to leave that to you, Munakata-sensei?" Ryuuzaki asks, and although she wants to do nothing more than run away, pride and something else keep her feet firmly planted on the clay.

"Leave it to the people who actually care about her." Munakata turns away from her, and is, for once, yelling across the courts to all of the assembled players.

As if you do, Ryuuzaki wants to snap at his back, but she has grown up in a world where leaving things unsaid is often for the best and knows how to choke down anything unsuitable for public speaking.

-

"Coach," Ryuuzaki hears, and stops by the gym once again, peering in to watch Munakata and Oka. Her chauffeur stands a dozen yards away by the car, silently waiting for her, and Ryuuzaki knows the tasks awaiting her will take most of her evening, or what is left of it. She knows she shouldn't stop.

A ball hits Oka, knocks her to the ground, and Munakata serves before she can even stumble to her feet again, slamming into her side. Ryuuzaki gasps in sympathy pain, and ducks away before - she hopes - Munakata notices her.

Somehow, Ryuuzaki doubts that is the case.

-

It is not a rare event for her father to have guests over, even ones who do not join him for dinner but go straight to his study, where they converse in quiet tones and subtle body language. But the first time she heard Munakata's voice in the study surprised her, and each time after that the surprise does not lesson.

She does not eavesdrop, does not watch him leave, because both things would be childish and unlike her, a betrayal to the morals she grew up with. But there are times when she can't help but hear the words he speaks, the tone in his voice that books no argument, hear his footsteps across the foyer, hear the door close quietly behind him.

She watches him leave from a window; her bedroom, the music room, one of the unused guest rooms, studying his back as he cross the wide lawn.

It is not rare for her father to have company, but she wonders why him, why this man who is supposed to be her coach but whom she can't seem to accept or like.

Ryuuzaki burns with questions, and suspects her father can read all of the questions in her careful words, the burn of her eyes, the set of her jaw, the lines of her body, but he answers nothing and provides no clues.

Ryuuzaki's dreams trouble her: filled with blurry images she does not wish to probe.

-

"Your coach is a tough old bastard," Ozaki says, and laughs, wildly, almost bitterly.

"Ozaki-san," Ryyuzaki begins, "do not speak ill of-"

"He is. Even you think it." Ozaki turns to her, staes at her. "Do you know what he told Toudou?"

Ryuuzaki doesn't believe in gossip, tries to never encourage it, but not even she can resist curiosity, and shakes her head, mutely encouraging Ozaki to continue.

"Not to make her pick. That the best thing a man can do for a woman he loves is not stand in her way." He continues after that, but Ryuuzaki doesn't pay attention; her mind is on Munakata, on Oka, on all of them.

It only serves to enforce Ryuuzaki's belief that he cares not at all for Oka, just encouraging a tennis player.

-

"Again," Munakata barks. "Do you want to represent Japan on an international level?"

Ryuuzaki knows about the plans for the tournament, because her father has seen fit to let her in; only a few other people are supposed to know, and Ryuuzaki knows that Munakata is one of them. Oka should not be.

She stops again, to watch them at the gym: Oka does not look as worn as usual, but Ryuuzaki puts that down to stamina, not a lessening of Munakata's training. She is right, she realizes, when he serves, and yells, "Make this one incomparable."

Oka returns it, barely, and Munakata gets a point on her. He looks to the windows then, and Ryuuzaki ducks away, although she knows he has seen her. Her pace is not hurried when she walks to the car, but she is conscious of everything around her, hoping he does not look for her. Hoping he does.

She's not sure if she is relieved or disappointed when he does not. Ryuuzaki drives away, hearing the echo of tennis balls against indoor floors in her mind.

-

"I will not go easy on her," Ryuuzaki tells Toudou, before her game with Oka.

"Anything else would be betraying her," Toudou says, simply; and Ryuuzaki realizes that he has the type of faith in Oka that a dying man has in god. "Munakata has trained her well."

"Tennis is a mental game, as well as a physical game," Ryuuzaki says, remembering something her father once told her, and Toudou nods and agrees.

"She proved she had the mental ability for it when she came back the first time."

Something in her chest tightens then, and she has to wonder if it is all Munakata, or just some of him that has driven Oka to this point.

-

Ryuuzaki watches Oka across the courts, breathing sharply as she chases each ball, and does not wonder: she knows that this is the future of Japanese tennis and even before the end of the second set, knows she is going to lose. Her shots do not ease up and she plays with everything inside of her: the game becomes easier, almost, as she simply enjoys the game.

Ryuuzaki watches the ball fly past her, the final shot, and straightens; across from her, Oka looks slightly dazed.

"Thank you," Ryuuzaki whispers, before she walks across the court, head held high and smile on her lips: she does not think if he will hear, but the thanks are in her heart.

  



End file.
